The IT Risk Most Florida Companies Underestimate
Hurricanes Don’t Just Knock Out Power — They Disrupt Business IT
If you’re running a business in Florida, you’re already familiar with hurricane season. You might have backup power, storm shutters, or even flood insurance in place. But when was the last time you looked at your IT systems with the same urgency?
Every year, we see the same story play out across Tampa Bay. Businesses lose power.
Internet goes down. Offices flood. But the real damage isn’t from the storm — it’s from the days or weeks that follow, when staff can’t work, data is inaccessible, and customers can’t get through.
What separates the businesses that stay operational from the ones that go dark? A resilient IT plan built specifically for this region.
How Much Does Downtime Actually Cost?
The numbers speak for themselves:
⁍ 25% of businesses don’t reopen after a disaster, according to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).
⁍ The Uptime Institute found that 45% of outages in 2023 cost businesses between $100,000 and $1 million. (Source: Annual Outage Analysis)
⁍ Even smaller disruptions are expensive. According to Atlassian, the average cost of IT downtime for small to mid-sized businesses ranges from $137 to $427 per minute.
And these don’t include the reputational costs when customers can’t get through, or when your team misses deadlines due to inaccessible systems.
Lessons from Hurricanes Helene and Milton
In late 2024, Hurricanes Helene and Milton struck Florida within weeks of each other, causing unprecedented damage:
⁍ Infrastructure Damage: Helene alone caused over $1.1 billion in damages across Manatee and Sarasota Counties alone, affecting thousands of businesses and homes.
⁍ Power Outages: Milton left approximately 3.4 million utility customers without power, severely impacting business operations across the state.
⁍ Small Business Struggles: Nearly 60% of Florida’s small businesses were in the path of Hurricane Milton, affecting about 1.9 million businesses that employ approximately 4 million people. Tampa Bay Times
These events underscore the importance of having a comprehensive IT disaster recovery and business continuity plan in place.
The Gaps in Most IT Disaster Plans
It’s common to hear “we back up our files to the cloud” as a disaster plan. But that’s only part of the equation.
Let’s break it down:
- Can your team actually access critical apps and files from anywhere, without a VPN or on-site server?
- Are your systems backed up in a way that allows fast recovery — not just data, but full configurations, software, and user permissions?
- Do you have a redundant internet plan if your main provider goes down?
- Does your team know what to do — who to contact, how to work, and how to communicate if your normal systems fail?
Many companies have fragments of a plan — but not a full strategy. That’s what we help fix.
We’re Local. We’ve Lived Through This.
Verified Technologies is based right here in St. Petersburg, and we’ve supported Tampa Bay businesses through hurricanes, grid failures, and emergency shutdowns for over a decade.
We don’t just understand the technical side — we understand the local challenges. Saltwater intrusion. Spotty ISP coverage. Power grids that fail for days. We’ve built disaster-ready IT systems for clients across Clearwater, Tampa, and St. Pete because we’ve seen firsthand what works — and what leaves companies stranded.
What a Complete Plan Looks Like
We help businesses prepare for hurricane season and other IT disruptions with:
- A Business Technology Review that identifies risks and weaknesses in your infrastructure.
- Transitioning to cloud-first systems like Microsoft 365 and Azure Virtual Desktop for secure, remote access.
- Creating disaster communication plans so your team knows exactly what to do.
- Implementing layered backup solutions — not just for data, but for systems, apps, and configurations.
- Ongoing monitoring and support so you’re not left alone during a storm or outage.
It’s not about overengineering. It’s about building the kind of resilience that lets your business keep operating — while others are waiting for the lights to come back on.
Don’t Wait for the Storm
The Atlantic hurricane season officially starts June 1 — and peaks between August and October. If your business hasn’t reviewed its IT readiness plan this year, now is the time.
Let’s take 45 minutes and walk through your current setup. We’ll show you what’s working, what’s missing, and how to make sure you’re ready — whether it’s for the next hurricane, or just the next power cut.
👉 Schedule a Business Technology Review